Bank on Your Team

Victor and I had the opportunity yesterday to talk to a group of Small Business Advisers at RBC in Richmond as part of a day or workshops they were having. We were hosted by Sonya Reginato, the Sales Manager for Small Business Richmond/South Vancouver. We presented an eCommerce primer to get them up to speed on what opportunities their clients have from B2C eCommerce, B2B eCommerce, and online marketing – and what they need to look for to determine if their customers’ expectations are realistic.

It got me thinking about how much has changed in the two decades since I started ideaLEVER. Back in the ’90s banks were still largely transactional. You paid them a visit when you needed a line of credit or a loan. The group at RBC was totally different. While they are still bankers, they take a more holistic view of their client relationships. One of the reasons Sonya wanted us to speak to her team was because RBC wants their account managers to be more consultative and pro-active instead of re-active. In the case of eCommerce, they don’t need to know the minutiae, but they are now aware of the broad strokes.

While they are still Bankers, RBC’s advisers were impressive with their knowledge of a breadth of topics – they have more knowledge than their predecessors 20 years ago and can be quite entrepreneurial. They want to help you grow your business and for you to be successful so this year’s $30,000 loan for equipment or eCommerce software becomes next year’s $200,000 loan for a larger facility or other growth.

If you haven’t paid your banker a visit recently, do so soon. You may be pleasantly surprised by their breadth of knowledge.

We discovered a very creative loan product for entrepeneurs that we’ll share with you in a subsequent blog post.